Happy 12th Birthday to my beautiful Jaelynn. 🖤 TWELVE. Excuse me while I go scream into a pillow because I genuinely do not understand how we got here so damn fast. 😭 You have always been your own little person, and honestly, I wouldn’t have it any other way. You are smart, hilarious, stubbor

When I made the decision to homeschool Jaelynn, I knew there would be people who didn’t understand it. And honestly, that’s okay. They don’t have to understand it because they aren’t the ones watching her learn, grow, struggle, overcome, and absolutely thrive. One of the biggest benefits has bee

We need to start talking about mental health care like it is healthcare—not a privilege you earn by suffering badly enough. And that means advocating for better mental health care for both women and men, because neither should have to reach a breaking point before somebody takes them seriously.

There is something genuinely fascinating—and honestly terrifying—about collective hysteria. Because apparently humans can look at a situation, hear a few emotionally charged opinions, watch everyone around them lose their damn minds, and collectively decide, “Yes. This seems reasonable. Let’s al

Sometimes psychosis feels like being trapped inside a glass, soundproof box in your own brain. You can see everything happening. You can understand what is happening. You can know that the thoughts running through your head are wrong. You can know you don’t actually want to hurt yourself. You ca

There is a weird kind of relief that comes from finally telling someone, “I’m not okay. I’m scared. I’m unstable right now, and I don’t know what the fuck to do with myself.” Because some of us have gotten so damn good at suffering quietly that we don’t even realize how exhausting it is anymore.

There’s a weird little part of mental illness nobody really talks about: when your brain starts detaching from reality, sometimes it starts detaching from PEOPLE right along with it. And no, I don’t mean, “I need a little alone time.” I mean your brain can basically go, “Reality is feeling su

Kids deserve respect too. Period. I think sometimes parents forget that just because we’re the adults, that doesn’t mean we’re automatically right about everything. We are still human beings who get frustrated, lose our patience, misunderstand situations, and sometimes handle things badly. An

There is a kind of chaos that comes with having a 10-year-old anxiety-ridden Velcro child. Her name is Madison. Madison is fully capable of doing things independently. She can get herself a snack. She can find the bathroom. She can operate a television. She can navigate an iPad like she

Having a child with autism is basically getting a front-row seat to a completely different operating system while everyone around you keeps insisting the problem is that you “just need to restart the computer.” 😂 Autism isn’t bad behavior. It isn’t bad parenting. It isn’t a child being spoiled,

This morning, Zephyr was acting like he had taken a handful of hallucinogens and was just out here trying to figure out the meaning of life. 😂 He was staring at the ceiling, meowing at absolutely NOTHING, like he was having some deep philosophical conversation with whatever entity he apparently

There is a very specific kind of humiliation that happens when your 12-year-old pulls out her math homework and suddenly you’re sitting there with multiple college degrees thinking: “I have literally survived college-level coursework, but apparently I have been defeated by a 12-year-old and a fu

There is a very specific kind of exhaustion that comes from being at war with your own brain. Sometimes I genuinely hate myself for things my brain and body are doing that I never asked for. I take medication after medication just to function somewhere in the neighborhood of “normal.” I have

Soon my house will split into three different chapters. My baby is starting 5th grade. My middle child is officially beginning 6th grade homeschool, which means one of us is about to become a student, and the other is about to become a coffee-powered, Google-searching, “Did you check the dire

Today, I hope you give yourself credit for the things no one else sees. The days you got out of bed when it took everything you had. The texts you answered even when your social battery was empty. The tears you wiped away before anyone noticed. The battles you fought inside your own mind and

Some mornings I don’t wake up and choose violence. I wake up and choose… which color pill organizer matches today’s personality. Nothing humbles you quite like standing in your kitchen with enough prescription bottles to open your own Walgreens. I don’t even question it anymore. I just shake

Some days I wake up and it feels like someone else clocked into my body before I did. My clothes feel wrong. My skin feels too tight. My face looks unfamiliar. Everything is uncomfortable for reasons I can’t explain. Nothing catastrophic happened. Nobody said anything. The vibes just fil

Some of y’all don’t actually want peace. You want permission. Permission to keep making the same bad decisions. Permission to keep treating people like disposable napkins. Permission to keep avoiding accountability because facing yourself sounds way less fun than blaming literally everyone

Can we please stop confusing nice with kind? They’re not the same thing. Not even close. Nice says: “I don’t want anyone to be upset with me.” Kind says: “You probably won’t like hearing this, but you deserve the truth.” Nice smiles to your face and then vents about you in the grou